By Christian Koelle, Staff Writer
INDIANAPOLIS – Last weekend in Nashville was an absolute heartbreaker for Colton Herta.
Herta came so close to completing a complete sweep of the inaugural weekend in downtown Nashville but “tunnel vision”, as Herta said in the post-race media availability, got the best of him. Just six days after that devastating end, Herta rebounded with a third place finish on the Indianapolis-G.P.
“I think it’s easy to say, just sit in second and that’s all your gonna get,” said Herta. “On a weekend like that with how much speed I had, I just couldn’t see the race going any other way than me winning. I had tunnel vision with that and I just got frustrated in the car and I overdid it. It didn’t make me any happier after crashing out but this was good and was a good reset. I wanna say a great job to my team for giving me the great car to get it done this weekend.”
Herta is currently seventh in the NTT Data IndyCar Series points standings. It’s been 110 days since Herta’s last victory and the road from that has been a roller coaster. Herta has had the speed in qualifying with five straight top-five starts but in those five, he’s only finished in the top-five three of those. Herta’s speed has been there, it was evident at St. Petersburg but the luck just hasn’t been there.
On Saturday though, that luck was slightly sliding in his direction as he earned his top-five finish since Road America and rebounded from a disappointing 13th place finish in the first Indy Grand Prix in May.
Herta and his Andretti Autosport team head to World Wide Technology Raceway At Gateway for race number 13 on the season. Herta has three career starts at Gateway with one top-five and three top-10 finishes. His career-best Gateway finish came in race number one last year where he finished fourth.
Photo: Zach Catanzareti/Kickin’ the Tires